Germany’s and Europe’s next leader: an election of many outcomes

No coalition, no party! 

Germany has a mixed electoral system based on both proportional representation and first-past-the-post constituency seats. But each party surpassing the 5% threshold automatically wins representation in the Bundestag. 

Angela Merkel herself has governed with the Social Democrats between 2005 and 2009 and 2013-2021, and with the FDP between 2009 and 2013. Despite having a plurality of parties, Germany has a tradition of stable governments that last an entire legislation. 

With five parties likely to surpass the 5% threshold, it is obvious that no single party can claim victory alone and in the end it will boil down to which coalition formula guarantees a workable majority. Short of another grand coalition between the SPD and CDU, all other formulas require the participation of three parties. 

The options range from a still unlikely left-wing coalition led by the SPD with Der Linke, which includes left-wing social democrats and East German ex-communists, and the socially progressive Greens, which have less ideologically orthodox formulas.  

The only party ruled out completely from any coalition talks is the far-right ADF. Unlike Malta where the winner takes all, in Germany parties have to compromise to get part of their agenda implemented in a give-and-take process.      

Campaigning can change the polls 

For most of the campaign, the SPD polled under 15% while the Greens were scoring above 20%. 

The election started as a contest between the CDU and the Greens, which for the first time in their history presented their candidate for the Chancellorship, Annalena Baerbock. A coalition between the conservatives and the Greens, with the possible addition of the liberal FDP, was seen as the most probable outcome since any other options involving the Greens and SPD failed to translate into a majority. 

But as the campaign progressed, the Greens lost steam amidst a ‘scandal’ involving inaccuracies in Baerbock’s CV. The SPD started to gain new ground after opting for Olaf Scholz, the pragmatic finance minister and deputy chancellor in Angela Merkel’s government, as their candidate to lead the next coalition. 

In just a few weeks the SPD bounced from third to first place in the polls as the candidacy of CDU candidate Armin Laschet faltered. As in Malta and the rest of the world, leadership and personal charisma are crucial in winning elections. 

But while in Malta polls have shown no reversal of fortunes for the PN, the SPD has bounced back after having been written off. And while in Malta polls have remained stable for the past decade of Labour dominance, the electoral campaign in Germany has been a roller-coaster, with the SPD making a late recovery and the Greens losing their initial impetus. 

But a multi-party democracy like Germany’s may be more conducive to swings than a tribal bi-partisan system like Malta’s, in which partisan allegiance is more fixed. 

The SPD bounces back 

As the oldest social democratic party in the world, the crisis of the SPD incarnated that experienced by the European centre-left, being torn between left-wing roots and the dilemmas of managing a capitalist globalised economy, that is now characterised by greater inequalities, a decline in organised labour and the rise of identity politics. 

Not only did the SPD suffer a split in 2010 when left-wing elements teamed up with former communists to form Der Linke (The Left), but also lost out to the Greens among its educated left-wing cohort, and even to the far-right in some of its  working-class constituencies. 

It remains to be seen whether Scholz’s popularity is personality-based or represents a turnaround for the social democrats. It may well be the case that the fiscally conservative Scholz is seen by voters as a continuation of Merkel’s centrist appeal, with his rise more to do with rival Laschet’s lack of charisma. 

Much also depends on the choice of coalition partners. 

Next week Labour in Malta welcomes socialist MEPs, celebrating an SPD victory as a sign of its reapproachment with the European socialist family following Muscat’s drift from international socialism. 

Abela even made it a point to affirm his “democratic socialist” credentials in his Independence Day speech. Yet even here Labour’s present attachment to social democracy may be skin deep, especially on taxation. A Red-Green coalition in Germany is more likely to push for global tax rates which may have a marked impact on Malta. 

The Greens will be kingmakers 

The Greens have missed the bus for the chancellorship but they will probably emerge from the election as kingmakers, a big feat for a party born from the left-wing extra-parliamentary movements of the 1970s. 

Over the years the Greens have lost their radical edge and now comfortably govern Baden-Württemberg, one of Germany’s richest regions, with the CDU. But the Greens are also in coalition with the left and the SPD in Berlin. 

Still, they struggle to appeal to working-class voters and are more in synch with the concerns of the educated new middle class, who unlike more affluent FDP voters have more cultural than financial capital. 

Their upward trajectory contrasts with that of the Maltese Greens, possibly because Germany has a larger constituency of left-leaning tertiary-educated voters, a category which in Malta still tilts towards the PN. 

While Labour may bet on a stronger relationship with the SPD, the participation of the Greens, whose exponents in the European Parliament pushed for a harder line on Malta on both taxation and rule of law issues, in the next German government could also translate in greater pressure on Malta.  

Merkel will be missed 

In the post-Brexit/Trump world, Angela Merkel rose to international prominence as a sane voice in an increasingly unstable world, even earning the title of leader of the free world. 

Her decision to accept a million Syrian refugees defied right-wing prejudice and eventually paid off, to the extent that the far right AFD is not expected to make any significant gains in the election. 

And by governing with the social democrats and opening up to the Greens she reassured middle-of-the-road voters. 

Yet her international legacy also includes the imposition of austerity, which robbed the future of an entire generation of Italian, Spanish and Greek youths, and a reluctance to address the structural imbalances in the EU. Ironically Malta, which as a small island-state found ways to achieve a fiscal surplus by resorting to unorthodox ‘Muscatomics’, was a firm supporter of the German hard-line approach towards Greece. In the end it was the country that got grey-listed by the FATF in a decision backed by the US, the UK and Germany. 

It remains to be seen whether a change in government in Germany would give more leeway to public spending, aimed at restoring growth and social cohesion in a post-COVID world.